$36 million budget proposed in Deerfield

Eight-month budget is for rest of 2013; village to adopt calendar-year budget going forward

April 03, 2013|By Denys Bucksten, Special to the Tribune

An eight-month, $36 million Deerfield village budget includes savings in capital spending and lower-than-expected bids on construction project.

The document also includes a place holder for village salaries yet to be determined through collective bargaining, officials said. Estimates were "made in light of the collective bargaining atmosphere in Illinois," according to a village memo. Payroll for the eight-month budget period is approximately $7.4 million.

Village Finance Director Eric Burk, in an interview after a board meeting on Monday, said the budgeting of what amounts to about 20 percent of village expenditures is estimated partly on union contract terms already in place, expected personnel losses, additions and offsets, and what Burk called salary issue "comparables" in neighboring municipalities.

"Our police contract has another year in it and public works will be up at the end of this fiscal year, so we'll be back in negotiations," added Burk.

Negotiated contracts must go before the village board for approval.

Major capital projects for the remainder of the year include a $1.49 million infrastructure and road improvement project for Lake Eleanor Drive and Heather Road; $1.8 million in annual street rehabilitation and sidewalk improvements, funded from Infrastructure Replacement Fund and the Motor Fuel Tax fund; $330,000 for Deerfield Road improvements; and $365,000 for the Lake Cook Road improvements.

The village saved more than $600,000 on the Lake Eleanor/Heather project. Budgeted at nearly $2 million, the project attracted 13 bidders, said Assistant Village Engineer Bob Phillips, and Schaumburg-based A Lamp Concrete Contractors, Inc.'s low bid was $1.38 million.

Added savings in the proposed budget come from less capital spending as the Wastewater Treatment Plant nears completion this spring.

The proposed budget, scheduled to be voted on later this month, runs from May 1 to Dec. 31 as the village looks to shift its fiscal year to align with the calendar year.

Calendar-year budgets have been adopted by various area municipalities and in Deerfield is anticipated by members of the village staff, say officials, because of the relative ease of matching incoming property taxes and fees with expenses, in real time.

Added to the various challenges of village staff preparing two budgets in short order, the coming budget includes the costs of federal sequestration cuts, which went into effect on March 1.

In a recent staff memo, Burk explained that federal commitments to support interest payments for Build America and Qualified Energy Conservation bonds "will be reduced by 8.7 percent … Based on our calculations, the sequestration cuts will require the taxpayers of the Village of Deerfield to make up for a Federal shortfall of $24,000 through Sept. 30, 2013, $47,000 if (the cuts are) extended through the end of 2013, and $697,000 if continued for the life of the bonds."